Greg Chappell turns double agent against India

Sydney, Sep 23 (IANS) Former Australian captain Greg Chappell has turned double agent and will play an important role for Australia during the four-match Test series for the Border-Gavaskar Trophy starting Oct 9 in Bangalore.Chappell, who heads the Centre of Excellence in Brisbane, will be an assistant to Australia coach Tim Nielsen and will accompany the squad during the series.

Chappell, who was India coach from 2005-07, is now working as an advisor with the Rajasthan Cricket Academy in Jaipur. His two-year term was also decorated with some bitter incidents. And some of the lessons from those incidents will be passed on to Nielsen, who was an assistant to Chappell when he was coach of South Australia.

“It’s good to be involved this time. Obviously it’s a transition period and always an exciting time. Obviously I’ll have the opportunity to work with some of the young players. Just talking about the conditions in India, generally, will be part of the role. Just what to expect in India, conditions, weather, food, all those different things,” Chappell was quoted as saying by The Daily Telegraph.

“We’ll be talking about the whole strategy involving bowling and batting in India. There will be discussions certainly with the coaching staff and probably with the individuals,” he said.

“It’s a role that the Centre of Excellence head does from time to time. Tim Nielsen obviously did it with the team on various occasions when he was with the academy so it’s no different to the past,” Chappell said.